Balls Deep for Labour Leadership

Ed Balls declares candidacy for Labour leadership

Youth is clearly the flavour of the campaign to replace Gordon Brown as the leader of the Labour Party.

David Miliband is 45 years old. His brother Ed is 40.

The newest candidate to declare for the Labour leadership, Ed Balls, finds himself in the middle at 43 years of age.

As leader, Balls would seek to build a party that listens to the people of Britain.

"I think it's really important we don't just talk to ourselves, we've got to go out and hear what the public say," Balls declared. If Labour had listened to its supporters, Balls seems to contend that it may not have suffered its recent defeat.

Perhaps Labour would have recognized what Balls contends to be a shift away from traditional Labour policy.

"I believe [New Labour] lost the moral basis of the Labour Party as it was founded ... the creation of a fair and just and peaceful and equal society," Balls remarked.

Balls, the Miliband brothers and any as-yet-uncontested candidates will compete for the leadership of the Labour Party over a four month period. Labour will decide the leadership on September 14, 2010.

The only thing that marks the difference between what this leadership contest is and what would have transpired had the party won the May 6 election is that the party would have been choosing not only a new party leader, but a new Prime Minister.

Gordon Brown had intended to resign as Labour leader within a year of the election.

So in the long run, this leadership contest means very little for Labour. Ed Balls will have to work very hard to be the one of this to-date young lot to emerge as the new Labour leader.